What He Wants
by vieralynn
Summary: Apostate Marian Hawke hides an unintentional pregnancy from the templar father, a man quite different from herself. After Hawke gives birth, Cullen attempts to reconcile. (written in response to a Dragon Age Kink Meme prompt)
1. Chapter 1 - Cullen

This story was inspired by the following Dragon Age Kink Meme prompt: _"I don't know why but I'm obsessed the idea of a pregnant Marian Hawke. I want Hawke to have one night of steamy, passionate sex with her M!LI. (I prefer Cullen but Fenris or Sebastian will do. Not Anders!) He then leaves her right after due to guilt or an argument. Cue the angst! Marian ends up getting pregnant and doesn't tell her LI because she doesn't think he would care. He's still in love with Hawke but doesn't know how to go about fixing things. He then somehow finds out she's pregnant. I want guilt, jealousy, and arguing (lots of angst) but resolving in a happy ending."_

* * *

**CHAPTER 1 — CULLEN**

Cullen sleeps with the glow lamp left on beside his bed. Cullen doesn't sleep. He drifts from counting rows of tiny dimples on the plaster wall just beside his head to a carnival's cacophony of images. One minute he's laughing with men he thinks of as brothers. In the next, bulbous flesh ripples out from the stone walls, ballooning around him. These monsters loom larger than their shadows. So Cullen runs. He runs up the stone stairs in the center of the tower, chased by what had once been a mage but is now an assemblage of gruesome body parts ripped inside out. Cullen runs without his armor or his sword, his bare feet slapping the stone steps, spiraling upward until he stumbles. He stumbles again. His foot slips on the next step. He falls, dropping down through the center of the tower, down into the darkness, falling too fast to gulp the air rushing past him. Just before he crashes into the tower's central pit, he forces out the faintest whisper, an echo of a scream.

Cullen jolts awake.

He chokes out a shout, heart in his throat, nightclothes soaked in sweat. The glow lamp beside his bed casts him in a sickly pale yellow light.

When the shaking stops, he shivers.

He strips off his nightclothes and uses the tail of his shirt to mop away the sweat chilling his chest. He wipes the foulness under his armpits and dries his back. Gets up. Walks to the foot of his bed where he takes out a heavy blanket from a trunk and unfolds it, covering his sweat-damp bedsheets. He sits down and leans back. The glow lamp casts a lurching shadow across his belly where his forearm blocks the lamp's light. Each night it takes him longer than it should to climax.

For years he has pictured the same face. Large eyes, caramel skin, him moving inside her as lithe limbs clutch his body. That sharp edge of her heel digging into his back. Their breath shuddering ever louder. But this time, she is not the woman whom he imagines. Not during the moment just before he comes. He sees another face, a different woman who he knows here in Kirkwall. A woman who saved him.

Cullen cannot decide how he feels as he spills across his abdomen.

Empty.

Both of these women saved him. The first when all he wanted was to live, the second when he couldn't care less.

He catches his breath as the second woman's image lingers, her face softened in his memory by the passage of a few weeks of time. He tries recalling each of her features just as they were while she was lit in overcast light on that day he met her out on the Wounded Coast.

Hawke.

The moment he met her, he knew exactly what she was, even before she ripped a blast of ice from the fade. The horrors surrounding him staggered and froze, holding still just long enough for him to shatter them with hard strikes from his blade. The battle against Wilmod, those demons, and those shades ended just as quickly as it started. Hawke asked Cullen if he was okay. His muscles shook uncontrollably as his blood roared through his veins. He had known something was wrong—terribly wrong—but he hadn't expected the horrors that lay slain at their feet, littered across the windswept rocky campsite. Cullen could hardly speak. His heart pounded in his throat. Yet Hawke remained calm. Concerned. _'Are you all right?'_

She was Fereldan, just like him. He could tell by her accent and by the style of clothing she and her companions wore. Never once that day had it crossed Cullen's mind to arrest her. That thought should have. Hawke was an apostate mage.

Cullen leans back against the chilly wall and lets his legs flop over the side of his bed. He looks out his window, out to the darkness surrounding the Gallows.

In his mind, he can still piece together her features. Hawke's long, narrow nose and her angular chin. That cropped mop of windblown black hair and those piercing blue eyes that locked on him from behind a messy curtain of side-swept bangs. She had a nice smile and her voice remained calm despite the madness they had just cut down. '_It's over now. Catch your breath. We'll stand guard and wait.'_

Once her image feels fully formed in his mind, Cullen tries to forget her. He reaches for his shirt and mops the sticky spill from his skin. He wipes clean the tip of his cock. He wonders if Hawke has ever bedded a templar. Do apostates bed templars? He thinks not. Most of the circle mages in Ferelden shared their bodies with anything that moved.

But not his girl. Not Neria.

Neria had promised herself to him, and Cullen believed her, even after she left, but not once she returned. The last he heard, Neria is still bedding that templar recruit who joined the Grey Wardens. Cullen has also heard rumors of other men in Neria's life. Just like every other mage, her promises meant nothing in the end.

He had been stupid to expect otherwise. Mages can never be trusted. Not with anything, especially not matters of the heart. So why must he think about another mage again? Hawke is nothing more than a pretty smile. In the end, nothing between him and her could ever work.

.

.

Weariness always strikes Cullen in the middle of the afternoon. He stands in the shade, off to one side in the front courtyard of the Gallows. He keeps his back to the wall. Hawke is here again. He doesn't understand why.

She is talking with Solivitus while picking through the man's box of herbal recipes. Solivitus writes something on a piece of paper and blows the ink dry before handing it to her. When a Fomari merchant passes a written message, normally it's a matter of guild business but Hawke is an apostate. She shouldn't be here.

The relaxed posture of her lanky frame reminds Cullen of the confidence she displays every time they meet. Hawke never cowers and her words never falter. Despite what she is, the sword of mercy embossed on his breastplate means nothing to her. Instead, she strolls the Gallows with the casual air of a noblewoman walking through a market.

Seeing her makes Cullen think about the debt that the Order owes to her. Every time she visits the Gallows, she always asks him about Keran. She did what he should have but could not. The day Keran returned, Cullen felt cheap giving Hawke the four goal sovereigns he had in his pouch. What a meaningless token for saving Keran's life.

.

.

Later that night, Cullen lies in bed. The quick spasms of the muscles in his midsection remain in shadow where his forearm blocks his glow lamp's light. Hawke's name spills from him as he comes. Her self-assured gaze lingers before him as her image fades.

Cullen rolls to his side and stares at the dimples in the plaster wall, just beside his bed.

.

.

It's mid afternoon and the recruits have just finished weapons practice. Cullen leaves them and jogs out to the front courtyard. He searches the square, eying each patron at the merchants' stalls and then he lopes down the stairs to the ferry docks.

She isn't here.

On most afternoons Hawke stops by the Gallows but not today. At least, not yet.

Earlier at breakfast Cullen overheard Kerras describe a female apostate who sounded just like Hawke. The Gallows aren't safe for her any longer and Cullen needs to warn her.

He waits, leaning back against a wall in the shade, eying the passengers that disembark from each ferry.

When the dinner bell rings the docks are empty. Other than Cullen, no one else is here, not even the ferryman.

.

.

Three days later Hawke arrives at the Gallows in the afternoon. She talks with Thrask while a Grey Warden named Anders stands beside her. Cullen hates the man on sight. Back in Ferelden, he knew of this mage, a blasphemer who twists Andraste's words to his liking. Ferelden's Circle fed Anders, clothed him, taught him, and housed him but the mage spat everything back in their face. For years Anders had been nothing but trouble. And then the Wardens took him in. Now he is here.

Cullen gazes across the emptiness in the center of the courtyard, his eyes focusing on nothing. He waits for Hawke to finish with Thrask. Waits for her to walk across the sunbaked paving stones and approach him on her own accord.

Eventually she does.

She says hello. Cullen exchanges pleasantries with her as Anders taps his foot. When Hawke is ready to leave, Cullen finally says what he needs to tell her.

He looks her in the eye. He has heard rumors about her, he says, and he hopes they aren't true.

She listens, her posture never stiffening, eyes never narrowing, remaining fully calm. She nods her head and wishes him well.

All the while, Anders hovers over her, his body far too close. "I wouldn't trust this templar if I were you. Let's go." He turns away without another glance back and walks toward the docks.

Hawke appears as if she is about to leave but, instead, she takes a step closer to Cullen. "I'll be at the Hanged Man tonight," she whispers. "Meet me there."

.

.

After dinner and the evening chant, Cullen wanders over to Lowtown. He wants another chance to speak with Hawke, and not just because the templars know of her. She took the time to listen to him that day they met on the Wounded Coast. He told her about the attack in Ferelden and about the nightmares he still has, all as she nodded her head, taking in every word he said. She understood. Since then, he's tried talking to her in the Gallows front courtyard. He has told her more about his past, but other people are always around.

Cullen knows how to find the Hanged Man tavern but, until now, he has never gone sits at a small table in the back. Anders is with her, as is the city guardswoman and a beardless Cullen walks forward,the din of voices in the tavern grows stare at him. Those who stand move back.A room full of unfriendly eyes follow Cullen's every walks over to the bar.

He asks the bartender for two mugs of ale. As the bartender pours Cullen opens his coin pouch. He counts out a few copper plus an extra coin for a tip.

"No need." The bartender says. He pushes the mugs forward. "It's on the house, Ser."

The sea of eyes follow Cullen as he approaches Hawke and her companions. The only sound in the Hanged Man is the clacking of Cullen's boot heels. Hawke smiles at him. She slides over on the bench, making space for him to sit.

"I got this one for you," he says to her. He places the mugs of ale on the table.

The guardswoman looks him straight in the eye. "Have a seat, Knight Captain." Her voice carries the cool tone of authority.

"You have absolutely no jurisdiction over me," Anders states.

"You're right. I don't. Indeed, there are aspects of this world that do not revolve around you."

Anders sneers and the dwarf makes a feeble joke.

Cullen settles beside Hawke. "You wanted to talk," he says to her.

"I want to drink." She raises her mug and yells out, "To a successful expedition!"

Her companions join in the toast. "To the expedition!"

Cullen knows nothing about the expedition they toast, but he raises his mug, clinks it with Hawke's and then with the guardswoman's before taking a swig.

The air around him explodes with the raucous sound of Fereldan voices. No one in the tavern stares at him any longer. Hawke's companions shout to hear each other over the noise as they huddle around their table. Anders and the beardless dwarf unfold a map and engage in a heated discussion. The guardswoman makes a joke with Hawke. Cullen can hardly follow a word anyone says above the noise. He leans back and drinks his ale. Each time he catches Hawke's eye, he smiles.

She always smiles back.

After another round of ale, Hawke leans into Cullen's shoulder and speaks into his ear. "Varric rents a suite in the back. Let's go. It's private. We can talk."

Immediately she is on her feet, beckoning him forward, so he gulps the last of his ale and gets up. No one seems to notice as he follows her up the stairs.

Cullen enters Varric's suite. He notices the unconcerned way in which Hawke leans back against the bolt and locks the door behind them. This woman trusts him far more than an apostate should. Although, after all she's done, Cullen will never do anything to harm her. He and Keran owe her their lives. He'll never turn her in. Even so, her confidence exceeds that of most people he knows. Already, he admires Hawke far more than any templar should.

Maybe it's the buzz of alcohol in his blood, but he is certain Hawke will never allow him to be hurt, not while she is with him. He is sure of this even though he can't understand why she bothers. Hawke would shield him. She's done it before and if the floorboards beneath them suddenly heaved and splintered, demons bursting through, shooting up to towering heights, Hawke would not leave him to face demons on his own. He knows this. He has seen her call forth the Maker's spirit and cast His holy light. This woman has defeated demons, turning them to dust before his eyes. On that day Hawke met him, she had no reason to risk her life yet she did, even after he beat one of his recruits when blinded by fright and rage. Hawke had been right. He shouldn't have been out on the coast alone. He shouldn't have. But Hawke had been there. She fought at his side.

Hawke walks across the room, turning her back to Cullen. As she bends forward to rummage through a cupboard, all of her length and lankiness gives way to the fullness of her hips. A pair of glasses clink as she stands upright.

"Varric wouldn't mind if we drank a Nevarran red," she says. "Although, he'll have words with me if I broke open anything else. So, a simple Navarran tafelwein?" She waggles the bottle and two glasses before setting them down on the table. She pours the first glass nearly to the rim and offers it to him.

"Just half of that," he says, feeling a sudden need to stay alert.

She shrugs, takes the glass, and knocks back half of it, gulping it down as if it were ale. Using the back of her hand she wipes her mouth. "Suit yourself." She pours wine into the other glass, filling it halfway, and she passes it to him before topping her glass off.

Everything about Hawke's posture exudes the casualness of an old friend. She sits across from him and kicks up her feet onto a chair. "Do you know of any work I can do for the templars? I'm raising money for an expedition. I need some more coin."

Cullen frowns. His stomach tightens. Why must she ask this? Does she not understand what he said earlier that day in the Gallows?

Chantry law leaves little doubt on what he should say, but civil law in Kirkwall bends and flexes like a bow. Shoot the right target and everyone ignores the arrow's foreign fletching and poison tip. Cullen feels confused over the pliancy in Kirkwall's law. So many convoluted webs of nepotism. Obligatory payments of bribes. He tried to make sense of it when he first arrived. He still tries, but his mistakes outstrip any praise he has received.

And now, here is Hawke. Cullen knows the price of unpaid debts just as well as he can recite Chantry law. He knows the touch of the Maker's spirit and he once knew right from wrong. When he was younger, such things were much easier to know. Right and wrong were clearer when he was a young boy, working through his afternoon lessons. As an infant he had been given to the Chantry, handed off to the lay sisters, women seeking salvation for prior sins born out of ignorance and need. Women who wrapped their strong arms around him as he sat in the warmth of their laps. Their soft breasts pillowing his back. His thin legs dangling below his shorts, small freckled hands holding open a book as he and a lay sister struggled to read its words. All those afternoons listening to one self-assured voice or another, speaking softly, right beside his ear. Together, they deciphered the words of the Maker, learning the messages He had given to the children who were left behind.

Cullen sips his wine, the oaky tannins rough in his mouth after he swallows.

"I'm sorry," he says. "The Order now handles its business internally."

Hawke frowns at him, chin dimpling under her upturned mouth.

His stomach tightens again. He needs her to understand the magnitude of the words in Kerras's report, partly for her own good, partly so he is never troubled with the task of arresting her. He owes her this, and he is certain that in her heart she is good. For as long as Hawke lives in the spirit of Andraste's words, he can overlook what she is.

He swirls the wine in his glass without drinking it. "The Templars commend your service. I believe you keep the Order's interests at heart, but the Knight Commander is concerned about an apostate mentioned in a report."

Should he speak of Ser Kerras by name? If Hawke worked as a mercenary for hire, Cullen wishes not to know. After all, she is planning an expedition and putting her past behind her. Any sins from prior days are left for the Maker to judge, and not to be weighed by men's biased hands.

He decides not to name any names. "A senior knight filed a report about renegade activities performed by another knight. This report described a suspected apostate." Cullen sips his wine, letting its hints of cassis and blackberry linger on his tongue. "Even if the Knight Commander fails to acknowledge the weight of your positive contributions, the Order will forever be in your debt. So, while I assume these other rumors aren't true, any further involvement between you and the Order is likely to lead to trouble."

Kerras's report on the Starkhaven affair had not named Thrask's accomplices, but his descriptions fit Hawke and that dwarven friend of hers far too closely. Unless she lays low, it will only be a matter of time before they find her.

"What is your opinion of Ser Thrask?" Hawke asks hims as she toys with the hem of her shirt.

Cullen laughs at her audacity, a laugh with the power to wash her words clean from this world. "I am not at liberty to discuss the Order's business with an outsider."

Again, her face knots into a frown. She looks down into her drink, avoiding his gaze.

"Hawke, I meant what I said today at the Gallows. There are rumors about you, and there is only so much I can say in your favor, especially if these rumors are used against you."

"There is only one rumor that matters," she says. Her words take aim at him, standing erect as a row of archers ready to fire.

Cullen swirls the wine in his glass and holds it up to the light, watching how the red tears of wine paint a high curtain before slowly rolling back down the inside of the glass. He feels tipsy. He's warm around his collar and his cheeks tingle with heat. "Earlier, you said you were financing an expedition. Do you mind if I ask what kind?"

"I'm working with some Dwarven merchants. I'm their business partner. We plan to enter the Deep Roads. If my investment pays off, I should do well. My mother is petitioning the Viscount to return our family estate in Hightown. The money from the expedition will help settled prior debts."

"Petitioning the Viscount?"

"My grandfather was Lord Aristide Amell. He would have been Viscount himself, you know, but that's not how matters worked out."

Back when Cullen was a child, a few of the young lay sisters read and wrote as well as the Chantry priests. These women wore their hair in elaborate braided coils. They made him scrub all the dirt from his fingernails before they sat him at a desk so he could practice writing his letters. As he grew older, he wondered what those ladies had done to end up in the Chantry. Now, he wonders about the poor decisions their parents or grandparents had made.

He asks Hawke the obvious question. "When your family's fortunes and titles are restored, will they lend their public support to the Order?"

"We always have," she says, although her tone suggests that choice was never involved.

Cullen overlooks this. Instead, he says what he believes is right. "I recommend you no longer seek involvement with the Order's business. At least, not at this time. It would not be prudent to become entangled in situations you do not understand, especially as an outsider. No matter who the templar knights may be, do not offer to become involved in their affairs."

"Even if that knight is you?"

"I only offer you my deepest gratitude." He reaches for the bottle of wine and refills his glass. "Please, do not make your situation more difficult, not when you have a choice."

"And you claim to know my choices?"

Her dispassionate stare unsettles him. He looks away to the ghost of himself reflected in a mirror on the wall behind her. He and Hawke should be passing their time together without arguing. Two Fereldans, relaxing, drinking wine. This is all he wants.

"I'm sorry," Hawke says. Her expression is as apologetic as her words.

He believes her, and not because he wants to but because he needs to. A belief as unshakeable as the unwavering home of the Pommel Star at the tip of the Southern Flame.

"Is Keran doing well?" she asks.

"He is. I keep an eye on him and check him daily for signs of possession. What happened is hard for him to talk about, but he seems alright, I mean, he doesn't seem to be…" Cullen doesn't know what to say. He gulps more wine. The acid tingles in his throat, a slow burn down to his stomach.

"I understand," Hawke says.

"Thank you."

Her long fingers toy with her empty glass, the tip of her index finger slowly circling the edge of the rim. When she looks at him, she gives him a lopsided smile. Such a forgiving benediction. Half drunk, he receives her blessing, her small gift of grace. He needs this, even when coming from a woman like her. He needs to remember all that makes him human, all that others see as good.

He needs to confess.

"After what happened to Keran, after he told me all that had been done to him, I cannot let go of it. I think of how this disaster could have been far worse. It makes me lose sleep. I keep trying to tell myself that I did not fail Wilmod and Keran — that they made their own choices — but I cannot convince myself that I am not at fault."

"Wilmod and Keran were victims of a crime, just like yourself. None of you deserve blame."

"But they were my responsibility. They were under my command. I should have known better. And had it gone for the worst? Oh, Blessed Andraste. So many of us in the Gallows could have died, all in one night, just like back in the tower."

"It didn't happen."

"But it could have. Ever since I was a boy, I only wanted to be a knight. I never asked for any of this. It's always a losing battle. If templars cannot learn to remain vigilant, then what?"

"You do your best and you do what you must," Hawke says.

He wonders where she finds her strength, and he wishes she could share it with him. She mentioned her father once, and a sister who was also a mage who died in the Blight. Cullen had met Hawke's brother and he knows of her uncle and mother. Cullen never knew who fathered him. Never knew the mother who bore him either. Hawke acts as if she belongs, as if she knows her place. She always looks rested when Cullen sees her. Lax, easy posture, quick with her smile. She and he are the same age, although he looks years her senior. At twenty-five, Cullen feels he is approaching fifty. Nonetheless, Kirkwallers treat him like a young boy dressed up in his father's armor.

"There's something I want you to know," he says. "I took time to look into what you asked."

"Pardon?"

"Over the past month I've looked into how the mages in Kirkwall's Circle are educated. They are taught little about the words of Andraste and almost nothing about how the Chantry functions. The Order should help improve their education. If mages understood these teachings, they would be more inclined to act cooperatively."

"Are you so certain?"

"Oh, come now, surely you believe in the Maker and the teachings of His Bride. Didn't you once say that your sister was a devout Andrastian? Tell me, didn't her faith serve her well up until the day the Blight took her?"

"She wasn't confined to a Circle."

"I don't see how that matters."

The look on Hawke's face is incredulous. Although he believes his words are right, he feels inconsequentially small. Her disbelief cast stark light on the ways in which he is different from her.

"I don't know," he says. "There are many things I don't understand. But, if a person cultivates unwavering belief in the Maker, they develop strength to resist all temptations, large and small. Their thoughts become too pure to feed demons. When that happens, they walk in the Maker's light."

Someone outside raps on the door and a voice calls out,"You wouldn't mind allowing your host to join in on your private party?" It was Varric.

Hawke winks at Cullen as she slides the wine bottle toward him. It's nearly empty. What is left hardly fills the bottom of his glass.

Varric, Anders, and the city guardswoman join them. Another bottle of wine is opened as maps are spread out on the table. Varric pulls a heavy book from a shelf and reads passages aloud. He speaks the lore about lost Dwarven thaigs that are lined with broad roads paved in precious metals. Stories about darkspawn that Anders corrects. Chronicles of ancient paragons, recorded by the Shaperate, those Dwarven non-believers.

Cullen watches Hawke drink in words that paint the images of her dreams. She has an adventurer's heart. Cullen wants her to go on her expedition. He wants her to succeed.

With another bottle of wine emptied, the guardswoman calls it a night. Anders agrees and follows the guardswoman out. After Anders walks into the hallway, he looks back over his shoulder and gives Hawke an expectant look. When Hawke walks out of the room, she remains three paces behind Anders, letting Cullen walk at her side. They head down the stairs, into the main room of the tavern. The crowd has grown thin. Only the roughest men remain and they shout gruff threats at each other as their chair legs scrape sharply over the floorboards. Here in the middle of the Hanged Man with Hawke at his side, Cullen feels dangerous.

Hawke follows Anders to the tavern's front door. Just a few more steps and she'll be gone. The next breath Cullen takes feels like his longest ever.

He says her name. She stops. She stands so close to him that he can smell the wine on her breath. Her eyes study his.

"How much more do you need to raise for the expedition?" he asks.

She tells him.

"I think I can help you."

After a moment of uncertainty, she waves Anders off. She asks Cullen to walk her home.


	2. Chapter 2 - Cullen

**CHAPTER 2 — CULLEN**

During the halfway point between midnight and dawn, Lowtown's streets are deserted. Rows of vendors' tables lay barren, nothing marking the former presence of their wares beyond a few mud soaked pages ripped from a shipping manifest. Cullen and Hawke's footfalls ricochet through a maze of seven storey walls. Whispers amplify into the distant clangs and acrid stench from the foundry provide a reminder than other people are awake just off to the south where smokey light rises up above the buildings.

Hawke leads Cullen through passages, taking them in and out of hexyards confined by the massive tenements built from crumbling limestone. They move through narrow alleys, past empty laundry lines, beneath broken arches, and up and down short flights of stairs. A communal garbage heap smolders as two soot-covered youths poke the refuse with long sticks, turning the trash so all of it will burn. Cullen doubts he can retrace this path during the day. Finding his way out of here will be difficult and he wonders if this is why Hawke feels safe showing a templar where she lives.

The sounds Cullen and Hawke make are bold and menacing as they tramp through the streets. Submerged in their echoes, Cullen imagines for a moment that they are Lowtown vigilantes on patrol, keeping the neighborhood safe. Judging from the way Hawke moves, this is easily who she is.

A paving stone tilts beneath Cullen's foot, throwing his balance. He recovers, clumsily, his palm slamming into the nearest wall to brace himself. Hawke slows.

"We're almost there," she says.

The alley opens into another large hexyard. A confusing complex of aged buildings loom around them. At ground level, rows of rusted metal doors are locked for the night. Clusters of stairways lead up to apartments above. When morning arrives, the hundreds of people sleeping inside will spill out into this dreary yard.

Hawke stops in the middle of the hexyard and quickly looks around.

"Here we are," she says. Her voice echoes less in the open where they stand.

"You live here?"

"Yes." But she doesn't point out the apartment that is hers. "So, what is the job you were going to tell me about?"

"It's not a job."

"Oh, of course. I just thought…" she shrugs.

"The amount you need to raise isn't all that much. I thought, after all you have done, it's only fair to compensate you more." Cullen pokes a gloved finger into the folds of his sash, catching the loop on his coin pouch. He opens the pouch and digs out his gold sovereigns.

All in a rush Hawke steps into him, her body pressing against his, her hand pushing his coin pouch back into his sash. "Maker's balls!" She looks over her shoulder. "Not here. Come on. Come with me."

She bounds up a flight of stairs and Cullen jogs after her. She palms her key from a pocket, opens a door, and lets him in.

The sourness of boiled cabbage hangs in the air, mingling with the odors of poverty. Heavy snores seep through a neighboring wall. He stumbles over a pile of boots lying near the door. The floor insists on creeking beneath Cullen no matter how lightly he steps.

Hawke speaks to him in a whisper. "Stay quiet. These walls are thin." She lights an oil lamp on a desk. The soft light reveals a neatly arranged stack of papers, a pen and ink set, and a leather bound journal secured with a small brass lock.

"It doesn't matter if you're dressed as a templar. In this part of the city, in the middle of the night, people get jumped for flashing mere copper," she says.

"What about the city guard?"

She smirks and shakes her head, but then she climbs up onto a wooden packing crate and beckons with her hand. "Come up here. I want to show you something out the window."

Cullen's mind races ahead as vertigo knocks his internal axis, leaving him whirling before he steps forward. He belongs in his quarters, back in the Gallows, not taking hold of an apostate's hand, pressing himself gracelessly against her a few hours before dawn.

He reaches for his coin pouch. This time he'll leave all of it on her desk. "Hawke," he says. He fumbles with the knot on the pouch's cord, "I want you to have this. I should probably—"

"Shh! Keep your voice down." Hawke squats on the crate. She reaches for him and grips his metal wrist guard. "This has to do with Keran and Macha. Come look." She stands, pulling him up with her.

Cullen's templar armor feels impossibly heavy as he hauls himself onto the crate to stand behind Hawke. She presses forward against the wall, her hands braced on the sill, her face in the window's open air. There is just enough room for him to stand behind her to the side, not too improperly close. He looks over her shoulder, out over the apartment block that is gridded through the window's metal bars.

"See that fifth floor window with a light on?" Hawke's voice hardly needs to make a sound with him standing so close to her.

"Yes?"

"Macha lives there. Now look left and up one floor to where that guy is sitting on that ledge."

"I see him."

"He's a lookout for the Sharps. His name is Ardal. He wasn't on the lookout before when we were outside, so we were lucky. He signals the Sharps to ambush people they're going to mug. The other gang members are hidden in the shadows where no one can see them. No doubt they are taking their positions right now, watching the hexyard and getting ready to shake up targets when the night shift at the foundry ends. The foundry workers get paid today."

"This happens often?"

"Every week."

"So, what does this have to do with Macha and Keran? And why is she up so late?"

"She does piecework for a tailor. Keran's stipend doesn't go far, especially since Macha has a toddler. Her husband died a year ago and left her in debt."

"Oh. So that's what this is all about." He knows Hawke thinks it unfair that Keran must remain a recruit, but he could still be a danger and there was nothing else Cullen could do.

"Last week the Sharps were attacked by another gang and the lookout guy, Ardal, jumped for cover. He went through Macha's window. Keran was on personal leave that night, so he was there when it happened. Once Ardal was in their apartment, he saw Keran's armor stacked up on the floor and realized Keran was a templar. The next day, Ardal and six members of the Sharps followed Macha and cornered her in an empty alley. They told her that if she doesn't get Keran to steal lyrium from the Gallows, they're going to hurt her daughter and then they'll go after her next."

"Keran doesn't have access to lyrium. He's only a recruit," Cullen scoffs.

"These thugs don't know that and they don't care."

"I hope Keran isn't planning on cooperating with them."

"Of course he isn't. But Keran is scared and, after all that happened between you and Wilmod, Keran is afraid of you too. That's why he told me."

"I'll see what I can do."

"No, just make sure that Keran's sister and niece are safe. I have information on the Sharps' gang leader and I know where they have their hideout. My friends are clearing out the Sharps tomorrow night. We even have unofficial help from the City Guard."

"If Keran confirms that a threat was made on the Order, I can also send templars to help you."

"No, Keran is already worried that he's in enough trouble as it is. Just make sure his sister and his niece are safe until the Sharps are gone."

"Are you sure?" Cullen asked.

"You'll make sure none of them end up hurt, right?"

"I'll arrange for Macha and her daughter to stay at the Chantry with a pair of trusted templars as protection."

"Good."

They fall into a silence not quite awkward, and somewhat expectant. A strong wind blows through the hexyard, lifting a whirl of dust into the air. Dried leaves that had blown down from trees in Hightown swirl like a witch's brew within a cauldron. The wind whistles through the aged buildings, sweeping trash from alleys, and flapping torn banners so the fabric cracks like shots ringing out through the tenements. Cullen thinks he should leave but he remains where the two of them stand.

Cullen knows that once he returns to the Gallows he won't be able to forget the hushed whispers they have shared. All of the small gestures that took place inside this tenement flat will follow him. He memorizes the sensation of standing close to Hawke while looking out over her shoulder, his arm almost around her as he leans his hand on the sill for balance. He imagines this as something they do every night.

But no matter how this night ends, he knows he'll wonder if he had gone too far with her or if he had not gone far enough. Either way, he already knows that he will feel regret. He tries to ignore this as he breathes in the floral scent clinging to her hair. Without exchanging a word, they wait for the swirling gust outside to die down.

When the wind calms, Hawke turns where she stands, her hip slipping against the wall until her body faces him. Her knee knocks into his leg. In that moment, Cullen feels conspicuous. How bizarre all of this seems. Him standing on a packing crate, looking out a window from within an apostate's rundown apartment. A long silence hangs between them. He shouldn't be doing this.

Cullen jumps down with a clatter and the loud snoring in the other room stops. He hears a cough. Hawke puts her finger to her lips, shushing him.

He remains frozen until the snoring starts again.

He should go. He fumbles for the loop on his coin pouch. Hawke steps down and stands beside him. He pulls out the only three sovereigns he has plus an extra twenty-five silver and hands these coins to Hawke. She weighs them in her palm as she looks him in the eye. She might as well be weighing his soul.

She says, "If you are giving this much away, Macha needs money far more than I do."

"No, you need to get out of Kirkwall. It's for you."

"But I'm not leaving Kirkwall. I'm coming back after the expedition is over. I won't be gone long. Only three months. Maybe four. Once I settle my family's debts, I'll be up in Hightown while Macha remains stuck down here."

"I don't know. Just— just consider it a loan. When you get back, repay the money to Macha."

Hawke's face gleams as she smiles. She pockets the coins and leans into him. She leans so close he can almost feel her weight pressing against him. She whispers,"Before I was born, my father knew a templar who always thought about what mattered the most when he interpreted the law. My brother was named after him. I know you have a tough job, but you're a good man. I won't forget what you've done to help me and to help others."

Cullen doesn't know what to say. His stomach knots. His innards twist around a hard metal rod. The flesh around his skull constricts. His head throbs. He needs to go.

"Be safe, Hawke. Maker watch over you."

He leaves before she can say anything more.

.

.

He moves through Lowtown, traveling the deserted streets without following any set route, but he always keeps to the widest roads, always heading toward the nighttime sounds of the docks, of cargo being packed and loaded. He doesn't know where he is but when he finds a long stairway fitted with a pulley ramp, he knows where it will take him. His descent into the darkness goes on forever.

Cullen is too late to catch the last ferry and too early for the one that runs at dawn. Boarding houses line the waterfront. He enters one that rents rooms by the hour. With the last of his coin, he pays for a room plus a carafe of cheap wine.

When he unlocks the door to room twenty-four, it smells of mildew, tobacco, and sour sweat. He ignores the stains on the yellowed bedsheets and props the back of a wooden chair against the door, hooking it beneath the knob, even after he latches the door's lock.

He undresses down to his undergarments before opening the shutters on the room's only window. A bell on a buoy tolls as the night air chills the beads of sweat on his skin. He looks out over the moonlit harbor while drinking wine straight from the carafe.

A glow lamp gives off a feeble orange light. He moves the lamp to the bed's pillow, lays himself down, and closes his eyes. Lying on his back, acid burns in his throat. He drank too much wine. He deserves this. He closes his eyes.

Foghorns in the harbor move closer, echoing a mournful sound that morphs into Wilmod shouting. Cullen knows what he must do. He must save Wilmod. That young man cannot make another mistake, so Cullen beats him for all the sins the two of them share. That is when Cullen remembers Neria. He sees her. Tiny. Lying in the center of the chamber, curled in a ball on the floor, barely kept warm in her padded silk robe. Greagoir will make him kill her if she fails. No, not her. He'll be told to kill the horror she might become. He'll behead it using the sword strapped to his back, a sword heavy with the weight of the entire Circle tower. He wears the tower fortress as his armor and stands out in the middle of the lake in the night. Neria said she will never give herself to demons and he wants to believe this is true. He wants to, but when Neria doesn't give in, Cullen does. Rage rips out through his open mouth, tearing his flesh inside out, exposing all the ugliness within him. He draws his blade when he's told,pointing it straight ahead, at anyone standing in front of him. Again, he sees Wilmod. The young man who is a mirror of Cullen. Wilmod cowers on the grass, crawling backward, voicing feeble excuses. And then suddenly she is there, Hawke is there, speaking to him._ You shouldn't have been out here alone with him._ Cullen shouldn't know who this woman is but, somehow, this time he does. Hawke stands above him. The mangled bodies of shades and abominations litter the hillside. Is Cullen the one who is dead or has he just killed Wilmod? Cullen no longer knows who he is. All the air is sucked from his lungs.

_You shouldn't have been out here alone._

He jolts upright, clutching at his neck, heart jammed in his throat. Acidic sweat pulses out of his pours.

After a dozen gasping breaths, the feeble orange light from the glowlamp reminds Cullen where he is. He reaches for the last of the wine, drinks it down with a gulp, and wipes the wetness from his mouth with the back of his hand.

He looks out the open window. The sky is still dark. Bells on buoys toll.

Cullen leans back and loosens the draw string on his smalls. As he works himself toward a slow climax, he pictures Neria's lithe form out of habit. But, just as he comes, he recalls the floral scent that clung to Hawke's hair and the warmth of standing right behind her, his arm almost touching her while leaning against the window sill. After he chokes out a sob, his cock feels foreign in his hand. The semen pooling on his skin reeks of shame.

Out of courtesy for whomever sleeps here next, he reaches for his linen shirt rather than the sheet when he wipes himself clean.

Staring up at a lumpy water stain on the ceiling, he prays for emptiness.

Instead, he hears an echo of himself shouting at Neria. The indignation on her face. That other templar who became a warden reaching for her arm.

Sometimes Cullen thinks of writing to Neria. He never does. The last thing she would want is his belated admission of gratitude. She's moved on and so should he. Anyhow, all of it was wrong. It still is.

Cullen rolls onto his side and stares across the dimly lit room. Hawke will surely be asleep by now, curled up among the snoring and the sour smells of boiled cabbage. He isn't certain if he wants to see her again but he knows that he wants her to be safe. He wants her to understand how thankful he is for all she has done.

But she doesn't understand. First she asked him for a job and then she called him a good man. Maybe she's just polite to an idiot who measures out gratefulness in the clinking of coins. But Hawke needs to leave the city. Kerras is looking for her. If she doesn't leave soon, she'll be found.

Cullen is certain he never wants to see Hawke again.

He stares at the cracked plaster, and maps out the web of dark mildew spidering across the wall. He will never see her again. He is certain of it and he needs to be certain.


	3. Chapter 3 - Cullen

**CHAPTER 3 — CULLEN**

When the Order's business takes Cullen to Hightown, he prefers scheduling it with a midday break, which allows him to attend the noontide Chant. The familiar words sooth him, immersing him in a predictable rhythm as he gazes at the bronze statue of Andraste, memorial candles flickering around her feet. Before he leaves, he always lights a candle and says a prayer for the dead.

One day, late in the spring, Cullen fails to recognize Hawke when she is dressed in Hightown finery, bending forward to light a candle near the Chantry's altar. One minute she is just another wealthy noblewoman saying a prayer. The next, she turns to face him and takes him by surprise. She even sounds like aristocracy when she greets him. It doesn't matter. Hawke is back. Cullen missed her.

Minutes later, he's walking beside her as they step into the sunshine. She does all of the talking and her tales are a whirlwind of fantasy. Stories of ogres and dragons and golems. A Dwarven thaig so old it not only predates the First Blight, but even the Dwarves themselves have forgotten it. Her stories become increasingly more unbelievable. Cullen laughs while trying not to sound incredulous. She doesn't care. Her tales grow even taller and he listens, drunk on the sound of her voice.

She invites him to join her at an Antivan dessert shop. He is on duty, but he goes with her anyway. They sit together under the shade of a canvas canopy, eat scoops of mellon sorbetto, and drink syrupy sweet dessert wine. In the end, Hawke insists on paying. Rather than leave, they linger just outside the shop.

Hawke brings up Templar business. "I never forgot the loan you gave me. I paid interest on it when I saw Macha last week. I gave her ten sovereigns and told her that the money was from the Order. She said Keran is still doing well although she worries about him. She thinks the Order is too harsh on the recruits."

"We have a difficult job."

"You do, but for the recruits the job can be far more difficult." She pauses. "So, how have things been for you since we've last spoken?"

What can he possibly say? Tell her how difficult it is to fill the ranks of the Kirkwall's Order? The everpresent lack of trained soldiers who are capable of handling daily threats? Or that Meredith had closed the ranks, disallowing help from outside? That he, as Knight Captain, lacked new ideas on how to police problems far larger than his resources allowed? That the city of Kirkwall itself seemed cursed, although he didn't have a shred of evidence to prove that. So, what can he say? Complain how his job has been difficult and sleep even harder to find? How he feels alone all the time, despite having people around him? He cannot talk about this mid-afternoon in the middle of Hightown. Instead, he asks Hawke about how her family is lending support to the Order.

Hawke laughs. "My mother made a generous contribution."

"Of course," he says. Cullen already knew of their donations to the Circle's library. Some of the money bought textbooks he had recommended: a moral analysis of the life of Andraste and an exegesis on the Chant. The Amell estate now sponsored the cost of training and equipping ten of the newest templar recruits. They had also made substantial donations to Hightown's Chantry, although Cullen never learned how much.

Hawke changes the topic. She tells him of a meeting she had with the Viscount plus a recent adventure visiting the Dalish, and how Varric is halfway through the process of writing a new novel. Just as they are about to part, Hawke stops.

"My mother is hosting a party next month and the affair is quite a who's who of Kirkwall. Surely, as Kirkwall's Knight Captain, you received your invitation?"

He hadn't.

A momentary look of concern crosses her face. "Oh, there must have been a mistake. It's a good thing I had a chance to talk with you." She tells him the date of the party and that she'll hand deliver an invitation, making up for the one that had surely been delayed by accident.

.

.

After the long descent from Hightown, Cullen meanders through the Lowtown market and wanders the maze of crumbling apartment blocks. Men with strong arms and strong Fereldan accents loiter in clusters. They drink ale from bottles as they talk about jobs they might find in the mines or the foundries. Women bustle through the streets carrying knotted string bags full of cabbages and root vegetables that will soon be chopped and stewed.

Cullen passes the entrance to the Hanged Man and wonders if Hawke's dwarven friend is sitting inside. Back in Hightown, Cullen should have asked Hawke if she still gathers with her friends in the Hanged Man. He wouldn't mind seeing her there again, having a drink and talking. He found it easy to talk with her at the Hanged Man. People minded their own business and the words he said there were not repeated back to him the following day by an insubordinate templar or, worse, by his own commanding officer.

He felt safe talking with Hawke. Issues that perplexed him made sense when he was with her. She asked him questions no one else dared to ask. She made him think. _Sweet Maker_, Cullen scoffs at himself. Hawke is an apostate. A mage. And nothing will ever change that fact. But she has seen things that the Chantry priests and most of the Order have not. She knows what he cannot put into words. So, regardless of what she is, he wants to meet with her again. But not up in Hightown. Someplace comfortable. Someplace where he is safe saying whatever he feels he needs to say.

Cullen turns the corner and walks behind the back of a building. A lady approaches him. Her lips shine with glossy red lip-paint, eyes heavily outlined in kohl.

She opens a small embroidered purse and shows him the purse's empty interior.

"Pardon?" He doesn't understand.

"Fifty bits for a blow. Pay a silver, in you go."

"What? You don't… No— no thank you."

"Oh, listen to your sweet voice! You're a Fereldan boy. No wonder you're down here." The woman takes his arm. "I should have known when I saw you. All you Fereldan boys are so handsome and strapping. Especially you, Ser. Visiting your family for the evening?"

"I— No, I don't have family."

"You don't? I could keep you company."

"Oh, no. I mean—" Cullen carefully twists his arm free. "I need to be somewhere else— I need to go."

"I'm here when you change your mind, Fereldan boy," she calls after him as he hustles away.

He hurries down a short flight of stairs and turns into a hexyard where girls beat wet laundry clean and young children run after each other, taking turns kicking a ball. Somewhere, facing into one of these hexyards, is the apartment where Macha lives.

Cullen looks up, searching for the ledge where the lookout man sat on that windy night last autumn. All of these tenement blocks look the same. Crumbling limestone. Trash heaps in the alleys, sagging laundry lines, tattered banners hanging limp, their color bleached by years of sun and dirtied by foundry smoke.

He'll never find Macha. Even if he saw her, he doesn't know what he would say. '_Sorry about Keran's pay. While there is nothing I can do about his status, surely that ten sovereign helped you?_' What garbage! His stomach sours as his diaphragm contracts. He's unable to help and he knows it. He doesn't know what to do to aid Keran and nothing he might say to Macha feels right. He should turn around, walk back to the Hanged Man, and order himself a drink. But then he remembers how the locals looked at him that last time. They stared him down like he was the Chantry Law coming in to start trouble. They're probably protective of that that mage, Anders, who runs the free clinic. Forget it. It's not worth the bother.

Cullen looks for a stairway that will take him down to the docks.

.

.

Even though it is only late spring, the afternoon sun at the Gallows feels as hot as late summer in Ferelden. Cullen must have been half asleep while standing in the courtyard because the moment Hawke says hello to him, he swears he never saw her approach.

"How are you?" she asks.

"Good."

She hands him an envelope stamped with gold leaf and sealed in wax with the Amell family crest. "Here's your invitation. The guest list only has your name right now but you are welcome to bring a guest."

"Oh, no. No. It will just be me."

She smiles at him in a manner that seems just a bit coy. "I have some business with Solivitus. I'll see you later."

Just as she turns he decides to ask. "Wait, Hawke?"

"Yes?"

"Do you… do you still go to the Hanged Man in the evenings?"

"More often than not. I'll be there tonight."

"You will?"

"Are you free?"

"Of course." He knows he sounds far too eager when he says that.

Her gaze flits down the length of his body before returning to his face. "Good," she says. "I'll see you there."

"Yes. See you tonight."

She turns and walks away. After a few steps, she looks over her shoulder and smiles at him before turning back. He watches her walk across the courtyard, over to Solivitus' shop. Even from a distance, Cullen hears Solivitus greet Hawke with the flourish reserved for the highest of the aristocracy. News always travels fast in the Gallows. Everyone knows about the donations that the Amell family has made to the Circle, the Order, and the Chantry. As far as Kirkwall is concerned, Hawke is one of the highly ranked members of the nobility. So long as she keeps herself on the path of the Maker's light, the Order will watch over her from afar.

.

.

After the evening Chant, Cullen signs himself out in the Gallows logbook, granting himself a night of leave. When he boards the ferry he is dressed in his only set of non-regulation clothing: heavy trousers, a linen shirt, and a vest, all of it purchased from a tailor in Denerim, years ago.

He arrives at the Hanged Man. Men nod at him. Cullen openly greets them back.

He sees Hawke sitting with Varric, Guard Captain Aveline, and that pirate lady, Isabela, who was involved in a shipwreck. Hawke appears to look past him, but when he waves her expression bursts into joyous wide-eyed surprise. She stands up and beckons him over.

"Hey! Look at you!" she says. "There's a flesh and blood person under all that hardened steel you left behind."

To his surprise, Hawke makes a fist and knocks lightly on the center of his chest as if rapping on his missing armored plate. His breath catches in his throat.

"A man out of uniform is always more fun," the pirate says with a devilish grin.

"Knight Captain?" Aveline motions for him to sit down.

Varric picks up a pitcher and pours Cullen a glass of ale.

Cullen listens to them talk about a ring of criminals that the city guard is tracking and a thinly fictionalized version of the tale that Varric has in draft for his next guard serial. When conversation drifts, Isabela breaks in with a filthy joke and Aveline rolls her eyes. Nevertheless, the joke is funny. Once Cullen stops laughing, Varric invites him to join in on Tuesday night games of diamondback.

After another pitcher of ale, Isabela busies herself with pages from Varric's drafted manuscript. She writes tidy comments in the margins while absentmindedly biting the tip of her tongue. Aveline pours over the pages that Isabela hasn't yet marked.

Hawke pulls Cullen away from the tavern's noise. They sit together at a small table in a dimly lit corner. She asks him how he's been sleeping and how he's managing now that half a year has passed since Wilmod's death. They talk about the new group of recruits he is training and the ways that his current Knight Commander differs from his old Commander back in Ferelden. When Hawke asks if he ever thinks of returning to Ferelden, he turns the question around and asks her the same. They both agree that they plan to stay in Kirkwall. For Hawke, this is her family's home. For Cullen, he goes where the Order sends him although, he is quick to say that he is happy to stay in Kirkwall indefinitely. Hawke smiles as she refills his mug of ale.

.

.

Cullen cannot take leave every evening but over the weeks that follow he finds time any evening that he can. He slips into a comfortable routine of familiar expectations. Tuesdays for diamondback and, on some nights, Cullen is not the only templar to attend. Other evenings are spent with Hawke and her friends. The evening before the party at Hawke's mansion, she asks again if he will be attending.

"Of course," he says.

"Good. I'll keep an eye out for you. Oh, don't forget," she tugs lightly at the side of his vest, "It's formal attire. Mother has something over the top she insists I wear. It's practically Orlesian. No masks, thankfully. Nothing that crazy. Just ornate. Well, you'll see it at the party, assuming you can even recognize me. The shoes alone will kill me before the night is through, much less the rest of that dress. If you can't find me, look for me in the upper balcony above the grand parlor."


	4. Chapter 4 - Cullen

**CHAPTER 4 — CULLEN**

Sometimes Cullen thinks he knows what it is like to be a mage. He's witnessed his share of harrowings, although he has never been inside the Fade. Yet he understands how demons speak to men and he knows how dreamtime images go wrong. Such images have power. They move through the shadows, stalking spirits, tempting them to eat a blackened fruit from Life's tree. Just one bite and the spirit transforms into a demon. One more bite, and a person is consumed from within.

Perhaps it is not fair for him to think this but, a typical harrowing seemed an easier trial than what he had survived. Harrowings send mages to well-mapped areas of the Fade. There, they faced carefully selected demons who are brought to a battle ground by a purpose-built lure. Everything mages face during a harrowing ends within the course of one night whereas for an entire month Cullen endured the torments of demons and blood magic, day and night. And unlike an apprentice sent through their harrowing, all of Uldred's mages wanted Cullen to fail. They wanted him to break. They wanted him to succumb. Every time he passed their tests, they threw him into another.

Lying in bed, Cullen turns onto his side and tucks his blanket beneath his arm. He runs the tips of his fingers over the glow lamp that sits beside his pillow. The glass is warm to the touch. Hot, but not to the point of pain. He places his palm over the glass. This is what it must feel like to hold a magical flame pulled from the Fade. At least, something like this.

He is not afraid.

.

.

All the next morning Cullen obsessively tends to his duties. The recruits quarters are inspected. Blankets and sheets are stripped from beds and all the furniture pushed aside. Soap bubbles fizz in buckets as four recruits push mops in straight lines, painting stripes of wetness over the floor tiles until they converge on the corner by the door that is still dry. Cullen sends them back to clean spots they missed, and sends them back again to mop over their footprints. Later, when the beds are back in place and the mattresses covered in clean sheets and blankets, tucked and tightened and squared, Cullen finishes his inspection by bouncing a sovereign off the surface of each bed.

After lunch he oversees the recruits' daily drills. He keeps them in formation, correcting every errant movement until they complete their drills with purposeful precision. Once he releases them, dinner has already begun.

Rather than eat, Cullen heads to the empty bathhouse. The scalding water leaves his skin red and blotchy, burning himself clean of sweat and sin. He returns to his quarters to dress in the formal Chantry robes issued to every avowed member of the Templar Order. After donning his undergarments, he slips the saffron tunic over his head. Then the crimson tabard and collared jacket. Black cummerbund. Polished boots. Finally, he puts on the Chantry's midnight blue overcoat embroidered in gold thread. He ties it closed with a wide silk sash.

By the time the evening Chant has begun, Cullen strides up the long stairway to Hightown. He knows where to find Hawke's mansion. He has walked past it every time he has made his way to the Hightown Chantry. Normally, the mansion looks no different from others that line Hightown's plazas but on this evening, the mansion is a stately hive of color and light, buzzing with activity. A middle-aged dwarf greets Cullen at the door and checks his name against the guest list.

"Ah, you are one of Messere Marian's guests," the dwarf says. "I wondered if any of her friends would arrive. There is quite a crowd inside but she told me to say that she will be in the library. Do you know your way to the library, Messere?"

Cullen did not.

"Well then, go through the foyer, into the main parlor, and then enter the first door on your left. I am certain Messere Marian will be happy to see one of her friends."

After Cullen thanks the dwarf he takes in the sights and sounds of the people packed in the mansion's large foyer. Women dressed in billowing layers of pleated silk and intricate Orlesian lace. Men in brocade jackets, tailored trousers, and ornate knee-high boots. As Cullen moves through the foyer's hubbub, no one in the crowd gives him a moment's notice.

The parlor is filled with Hightown's most notable. The Comte de Launcet and his wife, Seneschal Bran with a female friend, the Reinhardts, and even Viscount Marlowe Dumar himself. All of them listen to a string quartet while glancing around the crowd to see who else has arrived.

Cullen takes a glass of wine from a serving tray. He walks toward the library door but the doorway is blocked by Saemus Dumar. The young man leans his lanky body against the doorframe while staring up, absentmindedly, at the lighted lanterns hanging above the crowd. When Cullen asks to pass through the door, Saemus sways out of the way, doing nothing more to acknowledge Cullen. And neither do the nobles standing in the library in clusters, chatting as they drink wine and nibble at delicately sliced meat served atop small crisps.

Kirkwall is the first place Cullen has lived were nobility express their disdain toward the Order. He assumes these people know who he is until a middle aged woman says to him, "And you must be one of the brothers sponsored by the Amell family."

"Pardon? Oh, no, I'm not a sponsored brother. I am Knight Captain Cullen."

"A templar knight?" She tut-tuts. "I had thought you were a scholar from the Chantry given your dress. Surely you know that the Amells have a long history of sponsoring young men like yourself, and all of them engaged in academic research. Lord Aristide funded many notable discoveries in the natural and philosophical sciences. And, before him, his father Lord Harworth did the same."

"I studied as a Chantry brother for years before taking my knighthood."

"Did you? Yet you opted for knighthood instead. You sound Fereldan. Were you a brother in Denerim?"

"I was, for two years, although I started off as a lay brother at Redcliffe Chantry. At age eighteen I continued my studies in Denerim. When I turned twenty I applied for admittance into the Templar Order."

"I have heard that the quality of scholarship at Denerim's Chantry is surprisingly good. Why did you decide to give up a life of scholarship to become a _templar_?" The phrase 'of all things' remained unspoken yet clearly implied.

The woman's question unsettles Cullen, and he wants this line of conversation to end, so he stammers a hasty reply. His jumble of words acknowledge the woman's views while obscuring his opinions on the matter. Always, it is a waste of time to explain a templar's selfless work. The moment the woman pauses to sip her wine, Cullen excuses himself. "Maker watch over you," he says. He bows his head ever so slightly.

While walking through the crowded room, he looks for Hawke even though he is certain she is not here. After making his way to the far side of the library, he entertains himself with a book of classic Orlesian poetry. Standing by himself in an alcove like a scholar surrounded by his books, Hightown's nobility chooses not to bother him.

After paging halfway through the leather bound volume, he hears Hawke call out his name.

"There you are! I'm so glad you came." Hawke approaches him attired in a voluminous full-length gown. The dress fits as tight as a second skin around her torso and flares out at her hips as an upside-down tulip in a riot of rich silk. Intricate lace fans out across her bosom. The pale flesh of her knee peeks out where a fold in her skirt is cut high.

Another man is glued to her side. Kynon. Seneschal Bran's son. "And this is…?" Kynon says as if he expects not to care.

Hawke cuts Cullen off before he can answer. "My friend Cullen."

"And you are a Chantry brother?"

"I am Kirkwall's Knight Captain."

"Oh, a _templar_." The disdain in Kynon's voice is equally as pronounced as the contempt that consistently colors his father's words. "Correct me if I am wrong," Kynon says as he places his arm on Hawke's shoulder. "The Amell family has a long history of patronage to the Templars. When your grandfather, Lord Aristide, was a small boy, was it not a third of the Kirkwall's templars who received their food and equipment through an endowment the Amells funded and managed for the Chantry?"

"So I have been told," Hawke shrugs. She steps forward and reaches out for Cullen's hands.

Her grasp is so warm and firm that Cullen unintentionally gasps.

Kynon laughs as he glances away.

Hawke ignores the seneschal's son as she holds Cullen's hands in her own. She squeezes his fingers while smiling and looking him straight in the eye. "I'm glad you were able to come here this evening," she says. She gives his hands a final squeeze before letting go. A sudden emptiness opens up with the loss of her touch, but then she fills that hollow space by stepping closer.

"It seems our Marian keeps a colorful collection of friends," Kynon says. "Even mercenaries and elves. Can you believe it?"

"And what's wrong with the company I keep?" Hawke asks.

"Nothing wrong with it at all." Kynon toys with his empty wine glass before setting it aside. "No doubt your memories of life in _Ferelden_ makes you long for adventure." The man said 'Ferelden' using the same tone Kirkwallers use when speaking of the remote steppes in the Anderfels, tribal nomads in Par Vollen, and godless wanders in the forests of Rivain.

Kynon eyes Hawke the way a man with means examines goods in a warehouse. He squeezes Hawke's shoulder as he fixes his gaze on Cullen. "Have you spread Andraste's word to people in remote places?"

"Remote places?" Cullen feels stunned. "No. I was stationed in Ferelden's Circle at Kinloch Hold. Before that, I trained in Denerim."

"So, you are Fereldan. I should have known." Kynon all but sneers.

Hawke cuts in. "Ser Cullen, would you like a tour of my family's manor?" She leans into Cullen's arm.

"I— certainly." Cullen hopes Kynon chooses not to follow.

She takes his hand and pulls him through the crowd, out of the library, through the main parlor, and down a well lit hall. Ducking around busy servers, she makes a sharp turn into what is certainly a formal dining room, but the room is set up as a staging area for staff who prepare trays of food and drinks that they will bring to the guests. Hawke snatches a bottle of wine from a side table. Next, she pulls Cullen through the bustling kitchen and past the larder, and then out the servants door, into Hightown's crisp night air.

"Where are we going?" Cullen asks.

"You'll see," she says, her voice lilting with mischief. She squeezes his hand and hurries him down the alley that is certainly used by the servants.

She stops at a gate and unlocks it. "We own all of this," she says.

Beyond the open gate, moonlight reveals a formal garden with a vegetable patch right near the gate. Hawke pulls a handful of snap peas from a vine and offers him one. The peas taste sweet and crisp in his mouth. She offers him another, this time holding the pod to his lips while waiting for him to bite. For a moment, her finger tips brush against his mouth. He swallows, aware of every sensation thrumming and buzzing within his body.

He is afraid to touch her with his hands. Instead, he gazes at her, drinking all of her in with his eyes. If she would just brush against his lips once more. If she would, he would certainly lose himself to her affections. Although he shouldn't. Indeed, one brief kiss would sate his needs. Just one kiss followed by the fleeting moment of her breath heating the side of his face, and nothing more.

And damn himself. By the will of the Maker, he should summon some strength. Hawke is a mage of all things. A mage. And he shouldn't be here. Not with her. Not like this. Not alone. Yet, he waits to see what she might do next. They stand so close they are almost touching.

All of this should feel wrong yet he looks into her eyes, waiting for her to reach up and kiss him. This is different. Hawke is a Hightown lady and not a mage in the Circle, and while he is a Circle templar, here in her family's garden he is just another man.

Sweet Maker, a templar Knight Captain and one of Kirkwall's wealthy and eligible? People in this city will certainly talk. No doubt those who saw them together are already gossiping. Yet, never once has he heard the nobility mention Hawke's magic. Are they unaware that she is a mage? If they do not know, in their eyes he and Hawke are no different from any other templar knight being courted by someone who is already wealthy and titled. He has protected her secret this far. No one else needs to know what she is. And it is better for her to choose someone like him than a useless fool like Kynon. Cullen knows how to handle anything that might endanger a mage. He understands what people like her can do. He's not afraid.

When she leans in to kiss him, every fiber in his body blazes.

The warmth of her weight pressing to his chest, the touch of her hand on his cheek. He returns her kiss with all the hunger he didn't know he had inside him.

The forbidden is not what seduces him, but the strength that he feels when he is with her. He pulls her into his arms, holding her against his body like a shield.


End file.
